Curtain Care: How to Sustainably Clean and Maintain Your Curtains

*Collaborative Post

Curtains can absolutely transform how a room looks and feels. However, as with anything else, they can look terrible if you don’t clean them on a regular basis – to keep them looking their best, you need to maintain your curtains carefully.

Cleaning curtains isn’t super easy though, and you need to be careful that you get it right. By following the sustainable maintenance tips listed below, you can ensure that they last for a long time to come.

Dust regularly

Dusting is something that’s easy to forget about for months on end. However, it’s best to dust preventatively, or it can become much more difficult to clean than it needs to be. Make sure that you dust your curtains on a regular basis, depending on what kind of use the room gets. For rooms that have a lot of use, or if you have children or pets, then you might need to do it as regularly as every couple of weeks. 

Spot cleaning

When you spill anything on your curtains, you need to make sure that you take care of those marks straight away to ensure that they don’t stain. You can spot clean very easily, by blotting the spill with a clean sponge or paper and then adding some mild detergent such as bicarb. 

If there are any vulnerable dyes in the fabric, be sure to take that into consideration when cleaning the fabric. Harsher spot cleaning products can damage dyes, causing them to fade sooner than they would have otherwise done.

Machine washing

Eventually, even with regular dusting and diligent spot cleaning you’ll still need to machine wash your curtains. It’s important to check the product care instructions if there are any – some fabrics might need to be washed at low temperatures, while others may need to be dry cleaned.

If they are machine washable, go for a gentle cycle and use a mild cleaning product. If you wash them before they get too dirty, this should be enough to freshen the curtains up enough and make them look as good as new.

Air drying

With curtains, as with all other fabrics, it’s generally best to air dry them. Dryers are obviously a lot quicker, but can cause damage to the fabrics you place in them, leading to degradation over time.

Try to dry the curtains in a well-ventilated area, somewhere that won’t expose them to too much airborne dirt. For the last bit of drying, it can be a good idea to hang them from the curtain rail, but be careful not to hang them when they’re still too heavy or you might break the curtain rod or the brackets.

These relatively simple sustainable care practices can help to ensure that your curtains look great, while staying in good shape in the long run. If you’re unsure about how to clean them, it’s generally a good idea to take them to a cleaning specialist. Eventually, cleaning won’t be enough and you’ll have to buy some new curtains – when that time comes, take a look at online retailers like Woodyatt Curtains, to find the perfect replacement set.

*This is a collaborative post. For further information please refer to my disclosure page.